What Dreams May Come
by Niamh Cyneburg
Summary: Leah has long been the lone female in a pack of boys. Having given up on ever feeling the kind of connection Emily has with the Sam she lost, she is bowled over by the arrival of this mysterious boy who seemed to know everything about the pack already.
1. What Dreams May Come

**A/N:** I got more than a few messages from readers who told me that they didn't want Leah and Michael's story pushed to a one-shot or in the out-takes, so by popular demand, here you have it.

Don't forget to review!

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><p>Michael tossed and turned in his sleep, the bedclothes rumpled around his waist. Suddenly he sat up, eyes wide open, breathing heavily.<br>He had just woken from the same dream that had been haunting him for months. Drenched in sweat, despite the heavy air-conditioning, he shook his head in mystification and sighed as he got out of bed and made his way down the hall to the bathroom.  
>The 2 cops assigned to watch him during the nights were involved in a game of checkers in the living room, and he waved off their questions as he passed them.<p>

In the bathroom, he stripped off his soaking wet t-shirt, shivering a little as he did so; the cold of the air-conditioning against the wet shirt was extreme. Standing bare-chested in front of the mirror, he rested his hands on the sink in front of him and stared into the mirror, as if looking for answers. Cerulean blue eyes stared right back at him, reflecting the confusion he felt.

Trying to shake off this feeling, he turned away from the mirror, turning on the shower and stripping off his sweatpants while the water heated up.  
>His life had been an uncomplicated one. He was popular all through high school. Played on the football team, dated the pretty girls, somehow managed to get grades good enough to get himself into the University of Washington without too much trouble. Deciding to actually go there was easy, since his best friend from high school had been accepted there as well.<br>Jason and he were as different as night and day. He was out-going and popular, while Jason liked to hang back, his shyness making him less likely to step up and ask the head cheer-leader out. Michael suppressed a chuckle as he remembered how the head cheerleader had ended up asking him out instead. Jason had never understood why the girls had loved his broody quiet attitude. An attitude that had covered up a wicked sense of humor and a cheerful bent of mind.  
>Michael's pushing had finally brought Jason out of his shell by the time they had both gone to college.<br>Michael frowned.

And that was when everything had changed. Being Seattle's upper crust, so to speak, had meant that quite a few of their school-mates had also gone to U Dub. And they had tended to band together. That was when he had started to really notice the changes in Sandra Williams. She had always been a shy, quiet girl. He remembered how she had been bullied in their freshman year for being in the chess club, wearing glasses and being as unlike the cheerleader bullies as possible. She had never retaliated, until their senior year, when she had ditched the glasses, tried out for the cheerleaders and shocked them all by qualifying with ease. Once they had offered her the position, she had snubbed them by turning it down and accepting the captain's position on her beloved chess club.

He had remembered admiring her guts. He had asked her out for coffee then, and they had begun to date casually. Until that party. Standing under the spray of hot water, Michael's fists were clenched in impotent rage, remembering.  
>Sandra had never been a big party animal. A mutual friend had invited them both to join a group going clubbing, it was someone's birthday if he remembered correctly. He had been coming down with the flu so he had convinced her to go without him, telling her she needed to let loose and have some fun for once. She had laughed and agreed, all the while arguing that she had fun all the time.<br>She had come over to his apartment before she left, checking to see if he needed anything. She had offered to stay with him instead of going out, and he had told her she looked too good to stay home and play nursemaid. While leaving, she had winked and then left him a saucy smile and a naughty, "Then maybe I can play nursemaid when I get back hmmmm?" before closing the door behind her.  
>He had heard her giggle in the hallway as she left, and that was the last time he had seen or heard her.<p>

The next thing he knew, an anonymous voice was calling him on his phone, waking him out of a drugged sleep, telling him that he was needed at the Harborview Medical Center. Knowing he couldn't drive, he had called Jason who had taken him over. The pit in his stomach had only grown the whole drive there. As soon as he had walked in and given his name, he had been directed to her room.  
>Her parents were on the way, he was told, he was listed as secondary emergency contact. They had done all they could. It was just one of those unfortunate cases.<br>He didn't realize that he had slid down the wall he was leaning against, until he felt Jason sit next to him. He could hear them explaining that she had been drugged. He tried to explain that she would never have done drugs. She wasn't the type. She ran anti-drug rallies for crying out loud.  
>The doctor must have noticed the mutinous expression on his face, because he quickly explained that he didn't think she had ingested the deadly cocktail knowingly. Her drink could have been spiked, when she didn't notice.<br>The days after that had passed with a blur.

He remembered being at her funeral, her younger brother looking pale and drawn and trying desperately to be strong for his parents. He had loved his sister, despite their constant fighting, and he was desolate that she was gone.  
>Her friends had all been there, each of them throwing in a chess piece instead of flowers at her grave-site.<br>He had been surrounded by sorrow, grief, and mourning hearts; but he himself couldn't feel sad. He couldn't grieve. He couldn't find it in himself to be hurt at the loss of someone special. Instead all he could feel pulsing through him was anger. Rage, undiluted and potent flooded through his veins every time he thought of how someone had thoughtlessly snuffed out a life.  
>A shooting pain in his hand brought him back to the present. He slowly became aware that the water streaming down on him was growing colder, and his hand had a small trickle of blood coming from his knuckles. He had punched the wall apparently.<p>

Just then he head a pounding on the door, and Jeff, one of the guards, shouted, "Hey Kid, you ok in there?"  
>Grimacing at how that nickname seemed to follow him everywhere, he replied, "Yeah fine, be right out"<br>Wrapping a towel around his waist, he wandered into the room the two agents were sitting in, grabbing a beer from the fridge as he walked past. Danny, the other agent, grinned and asked him, "Should I be carding you?" to which Michael responded with a very mature bird-flip.

Leaning back on the sofa, he closed his eyes and thought back to the dream he had started having at the beginning of the year. It was always ambiguous. He would be walking down a very leafy path and it was always with an expectant feeling surging through him. And then 'she' would show up.  
>He couldn't tell who she was. He was sure he had never actually met her, so she had to have come straight from his imagination. She had shorter than normal hair, swishing around her shoulders, almond shaped eyes that sparkled, dark and exotic. Wearing a nondescript pair of jeans and a sweatshirt, she would hold out her hand and beckon to him with a smile.<br>He would go faster, reaching out his own hand to take hers, but somehow it seemed to take him forever to reach her. Just as their hands were about to touch, he would wake up. And every single time he had the dream, in the split second before he woke up, there would be a spark of hurt in her eyes, as if he had rejected her.  
>And it translated to him feeling deeply apologetic every time he woke up. He felt this burning need to apologize to her.<br>To erase that hurt.  
>To tell her that no man in his right mind would reject her. And these feelings were usually followed by an intense bout of feeling very foolish for not apologizing to a figment of his imagination. Casting a quick glare at the now empty can in his hand, he mumbled a further good night to the 2 men in the room and went back to bed, to try, however unsuccessfully, to get some sleep.<p>

Once he had left the room, Jeff turned to Danny and questioned, "Ok I know this is the second time I have been on babysitting duty for the talkative one over there, but whats his story?"  
>Taking a deep breath, Danny explained everything that had been in the file to Jeff's growing annoyance. Finally he exploded with, "Jesus Danny, what do you take me for, I know that already. I read his file dammit." Danny gave him a half-smile and then continued, "That was what was IN the file. What is more interesting was what they left out of it. He's a top level martial artist. He can kill about 8 men with his bare hands in under 2 minutes. You know what parkour is?" he asked the paling Jeff.<br>Jeff just nodded. Danny continued, "He uses parkour for training. The bust Michael and Ashley were working? He was in on it, the girl he was dating had been killed by the same cartel a couple of years ago. Apparently he took it personal... and so did they..."

He sighed, knowing the hell the youngster in the next room had gone through.  
>"After Mike canned the sting, somehow a couple of identities got leaked. I'm pretty sure that Jason kid got cancelled, but this guy surprised them. They ambushed him at his apartment. He was coming home, late, alone. 4 of them to kill one of him. He broke 3 arms, 1 leg, 6 ribs...," he hesitated before continuing, "and one neck."<br>Conscious of Jeff's quick intake of breath, he rushed to say, "The guy pulled a knife on him man... he could have shot him, but he just used his hands."  
>Shaking his head, Danny looked at the closed bedroom door before his face turned ugly, "I hope Mike gets those guys for what they did..." Jeff, speechless from what he had heard, finally found his voice to ask, "If he's that lethal, why are we here?"<p>

Danny gave him a half smile before offering a theory of his own, "Because Mike likes the kid, and if anyone broke in here to try and get to him, he would probably kill them too. Mike probably wants to send 'em away instead. He got the broken neck put down to self-defense, but he might not be able to do it again."  
>Jeff nodded and went back to studying the board in front of him, pretending to plot his next move, but Danny knew his head was whirring with what he had just learned.<br>In his own mind, Danny hoped that Mike would get these guys before anyone tried to break in to this safe-house. The kid they were staying with was no longer going to be warning off his attackers.  
>There would be a lot of blood spilled and Danny wryly added a thought to his inner monologue, "I do NOT need the extra paperwork."<p>

Meanwhile, behind the bedroom door, Michael gazed at the knob, digesting what he had heard. Well, at least he wasn't going to have that guy on his record.  
>His choices right then were to go back out there and pretend he hadn't heard them, or go back to bed where he knew that same dream was going to haunt him again. He arranged his face into a semblance of nonchalance, and then sauntered out again to join them, claiming insomnia as his excuse.<br>He was lying to himself as well with that. He just didn't want to see her face crumple in hurt again. He wondered if he would ever figure out who she was.

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><p><strong>AN:** All I can ask for now is a review or two.  
>Loves<p>

_N  
><em>


	2. Lightning Always Comes Before Thunder

**A/N: **I have no set dates to update this story, so the chapters will appear as and when Leah and Michael tell me what to write. Please go check out the blog from my profile for a picture of Michael.

This chapter is about setting the stage for Leah, her feelings, her expectations and her mind-set at the time of HATM. This chapter takes place during the beginning of Chapter 16 of HATM.

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><p>Paws pounded the forest floor, claws raking up dirt and moss that flew through the air. The grey streak at the head of the comet-tail disappeared before the churned up debris had a chance to fall back to the ground.<br>There was a freedom in running that calmed her mind; a weightlessness that made her feel like she was the only one left on the earth.

This was why she loved it.  
>It was her one way to escape it all. The pack, her family, the Cullens, La Push, just everything that had been weighing on her mind.<br>She had been on her way to Emily's that morning, to drop off a package of samples her mother wanted to send over. She hadn't asked what samples they were. She knew Emily was planning her wedding. And although she had realized that she no longer loved Sam in that all-consuming way she had done, the whole episode still smarted. She still hurt over the defection of her cousin, the girl she had considered a sister.

Joining Jake's pack had been good for her in so many ways. She had gained some distance, and with it came a perspective and an objectivity she hadn't had until then. She smiled to herself as she plunged through the underbrush. She had set out to just run earlier, no specific destination in mind, just wanting to be away from Sam and Emily and the discomfort that came from hanging around their house. Sam always tip-toed around her as if he was walking on egg-shells. She rolled her eyes; he probably still thought she was hung up on him. Not being in his pack any longer meant he couldn't read her mind anymore; he didn't understand that she had finally moved on.

Emily had long ago asked her if she would be her maid of honor, and yet she acted like Leah was still hurting over their relationship. Still running at an incredible velocity, she changed her path so that she was running parallel to the mountain. Knowing where her subconscious mind was leading her, she slowed her pace until she came to a crevice in the rock. Phasing back to human, she slipped on the short, cotton sun-dress she had strapped to her leg and ventured into the sheltered ravine. Climbing up the rock face, she slid over one last boulder and then came out on a ledge. It jutted out perfectly above the forest floor, and sitting on the edge of it, she could see for miles around.

This place never ceased to bring her joy. This was where she came when she needed to be alone. This was where she had come when the guilt of her father's death brought her to her knees. This was where she ran to when the pressure of being the only female in the pack became too much. Breathing deep, she leaned back and lay down, head on her hands, dark eyes watching the clouds chase each other across the blue of the sky. She felt the breeze flutter the cotton of the skirt, and she chuckled to herself at her new attire.

Once she had joined Jake's pack, they spent a considerable amount of time around the Cullen house. The vampires and wolves seemed to get along just fine by avoiding each other whenever possible. Until one day Leah had phased, pulled on a tank top and shorts and was about to go up the stairs when she was met with a pint-sized, pixie-faced, temper tantrum throwing leech.  
>Alice Cullen had then launched herself into a tirade of epic proportions. Leah had missed most of what she said because it was all high-pitched and at supersonic speed, but Jake had laughed himself silly while explaining it to her later. Alice was miffed because Leah didn't pay attention to the clothes she wore whenever she was around the Cullen's in her human form.<p>

She had condemned everything she owned as unflattering and boring to someone with Leah's fabulous figure. Leah was still figuring out how she had managed to compliment and insult her at the same time. Alice had then gone on to tell Leah that she had ordered her a set of custom made sun-dresses, in colors that suited Leah, in a fabric that you just couldn't wrinkle, and also folded to barely any volume at all, so it was easy to carry.

She had ended her rant by informing Leah that she had ordered these clothes to be delivered directly to Leah's house with the tags cut off, so she couldn't return them. Once she was done, she had turned and flounced back through the house, promptly followed by Renesmee, who had got imitating her aunt down to an art-form.

Jacob and Seth had nearly peed themselves laughing at Leah's speechless shock. And surprising them all further, Leah had gracefully accepted Alice's gift and tried to placate the feisty little leech, by paying a little more attention to her looks. Not to say that there was much to do there. Beautiful even before the change had taken her over, now she was nothing short of supermodel material. Long, lean limbs gave her a ballerina's grace; the muscled builds of the boys translated to a more slender loping gait for her. But now that she had finally accepted who she was and who she had become, it was easier for her to look herself in the eye every morning. Easier to look in the mirror and learn to love who she was, all over again. But she owed it to herself, she knew that much.

Drawing herself back to the present, she looked down at the trees and took a deep breath. She always made sure she came here alone, but maybe one day she would bring someone with her. Chuckling to herself, she recalled the hurried conversations Seth and Jacob had had over the past couple of weeks, even though they had tried to hide it from her. They had been wondering if she would imprint. Especially after Seth imprinted, they had become more concerned, because Leah was a wildcard. "The" wildcard, she liked to think. Narrowing her eyes at the horizon, she resolved to give Seth and Jacob a talking to. If she imprinted, then she imprinted, if she didn't then it wasn't like she was losing out.

She could wait.

She knew that if she stopped phasing, she would age and eventually pass on. But if she didn't, she wouldn't age. And that way, if there ever appeared a need for another female shifter in the packs, she would be there. She would be there to help. She would be there if another Quileute girl was ever in the same position she had been thrown into.

She was not going to be alone, because it wasn't like Jake was going anywhere. He would stay with his imprint, and she knew he would always have her back. Feeling like a load had shifted off her shoulders, she stood, and stretched her hands above her head.

Breathing deep, she pulled off her dress and attached it to her leg with the cord at her ankle, and drew upon that core within her that triggered the change. As she began to make her way back to La Push, she prepared herself to spend the entire day patrolling with Sam the next day. Jake, her and Sam were staying in La Push while the others drove up to Seattle for Jason Reynolds' funeral. With Quil still spending a lot of his time camped out in Makah, Jake had wanted all three of them on patrol because he was afraid something might happen to Kaia or one of the others. Jason had died under suspicious circumstances, and he was worried.

Rocketing through the forest Leah realized that it didn't really bother her being on patrol with Sam. She was over her old feelings for him. As she got to her backyard, she phased behind the bushes, pulled on the dress and walked into the house. She paused on the porch for a second and faced the yard; in the distance she could see the thick dark clouds gathering over the mountains in the distance.

A bolt of lightning flashed across the sky, and she felt the electric tingle of it on her skin. Turning back to the door, she was struck with the strangest thought, 'All this will change tomorrow.'

Puzzled at why she had suddenly thought something like that, she shook it off and went in to see what was for dinner.

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><p><strong>AN:** Well?

I neeeeeed to know what you guys think. I love Michael and I absolutely adore Leah, so this story actually means a lot to me, even though it didn't start out as a full length one. So please review and tell me what you liked/hated/loved/thought.

Special cookies for reviewers and the first five get a special sneak peek into the first chapter of Ryan and Michelle's story, which is almost ready to be posted!


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